The following is from Joel Sherzer (1993), "A Richness of Voices", in America in 1492, ed. by Alvin M. Josephy, Jr., 251. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.

On the eve of Columbus's voyage, Native America possessed an astounding diversity of languages, greater by far than all of Europe. In 1492, as many as 2,000 separate, mutually unintelligible languages were spoken by the many different peoples inhabiting the Western Hemisphere. Of these, approximately 250 were spoken in North America, some 350 in Mexico and Central America, and 1,450 more throughout South America. This diversity was manifested in many ways-- in the sounds of the languages, the ways in which they were pronounced, in their grammatical patterns and structures, in vocabularies, in historical relationships, and in the place of language in the different cultures and societies.

 

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